Rashid Mahdi

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Portrait of an unknown man, by Rashid Mahdi, 1960

Rashid Mahdi (Arabic: رشيد مهدي‎, 1923–2008) was a Sudanese photographer, active in Khartoum from the 1950s to the 1970s. French photographer  [fr], founder of a large archive of photographs dedicated to this "Golden Age" of photography in Sudan, called Mahdi "certainly the most sophisticated and one of the major African photographers of the 20th century."[1]

Most prominently, Mahdi's photographs were presented at the African Photography Encounters in Bamako, Mali, in 2005,[2] a personal exhibition during the Paris Photo fair in 2011,[3] as well as at the 2015 retrospective exhibition "The Khartoum School: the making of the modern art movement in Sudan (1945 – present)", presented by Sharjah Art Foundation, United Arab Emirates.[4] His work is also represented in the collection of the Musée du quai Branly in Paris.

Biography and artistic career[]

Mainly working as a self-taught studio photographer from the 1950s to the 1970s, Rashid Mahdi was one of the early Sudanese photographers. In 1957, he opened his first studio, producing mostly individual portraits or pictures of groups such as families or soldiers, documenting personal appearance and fashion of the time.[3] Using a 18 cm × 24 cm (7.1 in × 9.4 in) stand camera, he worked in black-and-white, but also hand-coloured some of his prints, sometimes using large formats.[5] On the occasion of his exhibition at the Galerie Clémentine de la Ferronnière in Paris, France, as part of the Paris Photo fair in 2011, his work was characterized as "perfecting the image by intervening in multiple stages, both on the negative, then on the print."[3]

"Man with scarifications", by Rashid Mahdi

In an academic review of the retrospective art exhibition The Khartoum School: The Making of the Modern Art Movement in Sudan (1945–present) in Sharjah, UAE, 2017,[4] the author writes about photography in Sudan: "The exhibition highlights the work of two pioneer master-photographers, Rashid Mahdi and Gadalla Gubara, as well as other studio photographers, [...] in the context of the historical linkages between photography, decolonisation and self-representation."[6]

Claude Iverné, who also created his own photo stories of Sudan,[7][8] characterised the photography of Mahdi and other photographers in Sudan of the 1970s as a "little known period of tremendous freedom, when going to a photo studio was like going to a bar."[9] On his webpage, which claims to present a collection of about 12,000 digitized images from 1890 until 2015,[10] Iverné has published many photographs by Rashid Mahdi, both in Iverné's own collection, as well as in that of the Musée du quai Branly in Paris.[11] In an interview about his personal relationship with Sudanese photographers and their artistic work, Iverné gave the following account:[9]

"Starting in 1983, successive regimes began enforcing Sharia law. The glorious days of the free image of the 1970s were even further compromised with the military coup of 1989. Those in power championed a rigid form of Islam. Showing those photographs in plain sight could get photographers in serious trouble. Some of them even destroyed their body of work. Others hid them locally, in poor conditions. I discovered these hidden treasures in the backrooms of stores, in humid, stuffy, dusty places."

— French photographer Claude Iverné, "Discovering Sudanese Photography"

Exhibitions[]

  • “Photographie Soudanaise”, Usine Springcourt / Paris / France / 2012
  • “The gifted man”, Cultural Centre of Egypt / Paris / France / 2011
  • “Lumières soudanaises”, Rencontres photographiques du 10ème / Paris / France / 2011
  • “Photographies Soudanaises”, Galerie Clémentine de la Ferronnière / Paris / France /2011[12]
  • “Lumières Soudanaises”, Flatteurville / Paris / France 2011
  • “Nouvelles Africaines” / Africultures / Confluences, Paris / France / 2007
  • “Rencontres Photographiques”, Fez / Morroco / 2006
  • “Another World”, La Centrale Electrique / Brussels / Belgium / 2006
  • “Sixth African Photography Encounters”, Bamako / Mali / 2005

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ Iverné, Claude (2015). "Rashid Mahdi". Elnour. Retrieved 11 December 2019.
  2. ^ "Studio al Rashid - artist, news & exhibitions - photography-now.com". photography-now.com. Retrieved 22 April 2021.
  3. ^ Jump up to: a b c Galerie Clémentine de la Féronnière. "Rashid Mahdi". www.tk-21.com (in French). Retrieved 20 April 2021.
  4. ^ Jump up to: a b "The Khartoum School: the making of the modern art movement in Sudan (1945–present)". Sharjah Art Foundation. Retrieved 24 May 2020.
  5. ^ The description of his colour photographs at the archive of the Musée du quai Branly mentiones the watercolour technique (aquarellé) applied to these photographs, as well as the print sizes. See source in References and External links.
  6. ^ Krishna Kumar, N.P. (4 January 2017). "Exploring the modern art movement of Sudan". Cornell University. Africana studies and research center. Retrieved 24 May 2020.
  7. ^ Aperture Foundation NY. "Claude Iverné: Bilad es Sudan". Aperture Foundation NY. Retrieved 12 December 2019.
  8. ^ Iverné, Claude (2015). "Claude Iverné". Elnour. Retrieved 11 December 2019.
  9. ^ Jump up to: a b Bernard, Sophie (1 March 2021). "Discovering Sudanese Photography". www.blind-magazine.com. Retrieved 30 March 2021.
  10. ^ Iverné, Claude (2015). "About Elnour". Elnour. Retrieved 16 May 2020.
  11. ^ The online archive of the museum shows 63 photographs by Mahdi.Musée du quai Branly. "Recherche - Rashid Mahdi". Retrieved 22 April 2021.
  12. ^ "Sudanese Photographs". Galerie Clémentine. Retrieved 30 March 2021.

External links[]

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